Colourful illustration of a tenor saxophone, with bursts of colour coming from the bell

Music

my practice (and how i got there)

A little bit of information of what I do as a musician and how I got there.

Exploration and reinvention

As a musician I am always exploring. It’s part of my nature to choose very varying projects to work on, stick with it until it’s how I want it, then move on to something entirely different. Currently this means that I’m working on arranging and creating own music. The past year I have started to work with live electronics and I’m loving the creation process, even if it is very scary. 

I’m an intuitive player – I play what comes to me and if I like it, I stick to it. This goes for ‘traditional’ classical music – for as far we can speak of that in the world of classical saxophone – but especially for contemporary genres. I like to combine new saxophone music with my personal explorations into improvisational pieces (and maybe some own works). 

A little more back in time...

My musical studies have been varied and haven’t always been limited to just conservatory education. In fact, I started with a Liberal Arts degree (University College Roosevelt, Middelburg) where I took courses in musicology and educational sciences, but also some computer sciences and art history (and for some reason, economics. We don’t talk about economics.)

A little more back in time? I was born in 1997 in Oost-Souburg, Zeeland, the Netherlands. When I was seven years old I started with recorder lessons, and after two years of happy squeaks I decided to switch to the saxophone. I say ‘decided’, but my mum picked saxophone for me because I literally could not distinguish a trumpet from a french horn. Luckily, it was a good choice 🙂 

I took lessons at the local music school (where I teach now) and happily continued making a lot of noise on the saxophone. As a teenager I met Andreas van Zoelen, with whom I subsequently studied during my years at university, and with whom I later also did my Bachelor of Music. Currently I am broadening my musical perspectives with a Master of Music.

Arrangements

Some of my projects are also available to others. Here is a small selection of arrangements that you can either buy or get for free. If you want any information on acquiring scores that don’t have a download link, drop me a message